DeWITT — Excellus BlueCross Blue Shield, the largest health insurer in Central New York, announced plans to award grant dollars for health and wellness programs in the region.
Excellus plans to distribute community health awards totaling $25,000.
Nonprofit organizations in Excellus’s eight-county region of Central New York can apply for an award of up to $4,000 each, the health insurer said in a news release.
To be eligible, the organization must be a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and located in Cayuga, Cortland, Jefferson, Lewis, Onondaga, Oswego, St. Lawrence, or Tompkins county.
The funding will benefit programs that target the improvement of health or health care of a specific population in the community, Excellus said.
The health insurer will consider organizations that offer programs focusing on activities that improve the health status of the community or that reduce the incidence of specific diseases, communitywide health education, group-specific health education, and wellness.
Excellus will base the awards on criteria that include an organization’s need, program goals, overall number of persons to benefit from the initiative, and the impact the program has on the community’s health status, the organization said.
The application deadline is June 9.
Applications and additional information are available online at http://bit.ly/1gdR7la or by emailing Community.Health.Awards.CNY@excellus.com, according to Excellus.
Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com